Gloriously cool and sunny. A doe grazing at the other end of the yard stiffens and cocks her ears at a crow call—a sure sign she has a fawn.
Month: May 2020
Hummingbirds fight each other; a towhee fights his reflection in the living room window. The sky is as blue and empty as it gets.
In the hot sun, a bit of floating down from a cattail, or a dandelion—some faux feline thing, which of course will land on its feet.
Misty rain. After drinking from the feeder, a hummingbird sips water from the ant guard as if to cleanse her palate.
I move around to the shady side of the house. Different birds here: oriole high in a walnut tree, towhee tapping at the dining room window.
Humid. An indigo bunting flits from bush to bush in the yard—all likely nest spots. The mechanical-sounding call of a black-billed cuckoo.
Overcast and damp. My mother stops by to point out the highly unexceptional call of the aptly named least flycatcher.
A tiger swallowtail visiting garlic mustard—wan white flower heads momentarily covered in glory. A blue jay yells from the highest treetop.
Sky darkening to rain. I realize that the bare soil I’d taken for the spoil heap from some animal’s burrow is in fact a growing ant mound.
A hawthorn blooming at the woods’ edge glows each time the sun comes out. A scarlet tanager calls just beyond: that plucked banjo string.
Overcast and cool. The big tulip tree’s few leaves not damaged by last week’s frost still wave. Beyond the powerline, a wood thrush sings.
Sunny and warm. Behind the screen of green leaves, a vulture’s lazy drift. A hummingbird collides with a carpenter bee over the yard.
A field sparrow fresh from bathing and a hummingbird fresh from fighting sit two feet apart on a walnut branch, shaking their feathers.
Late morning soundscape: scarlet tanager, towhee, great-crested flycatcher, catbird, red-eyed vireo, crow, the neighbour kids.